AM Alert: Managing water from Spain to the Delta

The answer can be hard to pin down, intensifying conflicts over the state’s most precious and contested resource. It doesn’t help that water rights and management responsibilities are fragmented among the state’s various watersheds, users and water agencies. Tracking groundwater use presents issues of its own, which could dog California’s efforts to implement sweeping new groundwater management laws in the coming years. So does determining how much water flows for environmental purposes.

Today Public Policy Institute of California researchers will discuss their report comparing California’s methods to those in other western states and arid countries like Spain and Australia, seeking a better system for aquatic accounting. (One bill worth noting on this front would set up a statewide water data management system). PPIC experts Ellen Hanak and Alvar Escriva-Bou will discuss their findings along with Mojave Water Agency’s LanceEckhart,the Environmental Defense Fund’s Maurice Hall and State Water Resources Control Board executive director Tom Howard from noon to 1:30 p.m. at 1020 11th Street.

Later in the day, the Delta Protection Commission will get an update on a Sacramento Superior Court judge’s decision to invalidate a far-ranging Delta management plan, something that could have profound consequences for Gov. Jerry Brown’sproject to build massive tunnels capable of conveying water from the Delta to points south. The commission meets in Walnut Grove starting at 5:30 p.m., gathering at 14273 River Road.

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